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Lally,

In the way of humans, things don't get protected until they're given a name - think every Fido on the planet eating good quality steak, and you get the idea. Despite the massive consciousness-raising by Greenpeace and others, it seems that whales need more PR. I must admit I don't know much about whales but wondering whether it would be possible to tag a group or family of whales, and follow them during their worldwide migrations. Most importantly, give them names and let the world know regularly about their progress throughout the year, where they are, what they're doing, complete with photographs and videos etc if possible. Schools would love this as a project. I can see already it would be expensive but imagine the furore if "our" whales were in the vicinity of Japanese or other whaling ships or worse were harpooned.

Considering that we're all kept up to date with the exploits of Tom, Reese, Lindsay and others, why not borrow from the celebrity protocol and tell us about whales too. It just has to grab the world's consciousness.

Yours,

Marine - Melbourne

First of all I'd like to express my admiration to the entire crew of the Esperanza and Arctic Sunrise for they showed us all thier bravery in confronting the armed-and-dangerous illegal whailers.
Seeing that, I desided not only to read the news about the expeditin but to join as Ocean Defender, and take my part in an effort to contribute in this fight for life on Earth.

Regarding the ideas for recruiting:
I am designer, so in the following days I'll be working on messages and slogans that can be use with web banners.

That's it for now, greeting to all from Croatia!
Kristian

In response to Marine's comment, why don't you expand it more. (By the way the idea is terrific.) Have a lets-adopt-a-whale programme. People can sponser pods of whales, and in turn Greenpeace would get funding for their Anti-Whaling Programmes and more people would sign up as Ocean defenders. Animal adopt programmes are already in place at Perth Zoo in Australia, and they are working wonders. It is something for you to think about.

Hello Lally et al,

Great job on the high sea!!!

O.K. I've had my thinking cap on but no coffee yet:(
However, whilst I was working on the effort to bring Luna home. (A young wayward Orca) I had an idea which worked out quite well.... Whale and ocean defender parties, potlucks or gatherings all you need to do is invite some friends over have them bring a dish or a beverage plus a small donation for the OD
campaign. Party givers can print out posters stickers and info for the guests. Fun, education and fundraising all at once. What do you think???

All the best,
Erin
cetacean_aid@yahoo.com

Hi Marine,

This has been done and it is a marvelous idea. Check out the Southern resident orca population in and around Haro Strait US/Canadian waters. These Whales have been named by Tribes and Schools and have photo ID work done by Ken Balcomb at San Juan Islands center for whale research. Also check out the Islands whale museum of Friday Harbor.

Erin

BTW: L57 (Faith)is my boyfriend so don't be tempted to steal him;)

That`s a quite good idea. Congratulations from the other side of the Planet ;-). Many whales have still names or numbers from scientists for research. A individual identification is mostly able over their fin. So the data is still in existance. You only need a homepage, the photos of the whales(fin), a database, guys who manage the stuff and a name like "Greenpeace" to get puplic attention. You can adope a star and give it the name of your girlfriend. People pay for that. So why not for whales. You can begin with humpback and finwhales which the japanese wants next year. When Greenpeace is 2007 again in the southern ocean (what i hope), and the japanese killed one of these whales (what i not hope), you will be maybe able to identify the animal. So the japanese do not kill a whale. They killed "Peter". The class 10c at the Highshool of Hamburg-Central will be quite angry. The japanese ambassador in germany get a image-problem when they want to visit him. Give the world "individuals" they can "protect".

My best wishes for your dangerous work in the southern ocean.

Mirko - Hamburg

Sometimes I wonder if the only images that would upset the japanese are fanciful pics of pelagic "Hello Kitty's" getting harpooned. Oh, the horror! Yes, maybe we can whip some up with our PhotoShops and send them around. Maybe that will arouse their curiosity. "Say, what's with the harpooning of our beloved Hello Kitty?"

Any one who lives, commutes, or just visits London regularly will know the Metro. This is a free newspaper. These are generally picked up on and read on tube trains and regular trains and then left there for others to read.

My idea is to stick the ocean defenders stickers on the an area of the newspaper (so it does not cover any text or pictures, on the back at the top seems the best place). Each paper is read by many people in one day and the message would probably be noticed by most of the readers.

It will stay in their minds and they may well check the site out when they are board at work. When they see the destruction caused the whales and our oceans they are sure to sign up. These people may tell there friends who will then sign up themselves, this could be endless. The good thing about this is you are not just communicating with those who you know but those who may be totally unaware of Greenpeace’s campaigns in the Antarctic.

I’ve been told that there are Metros in other UK cities and their must be free newspapers in other cities in the world, so this could work in any large city with a free newspaper.

You can find the stickers by downloading the action kit from this page: http://oceans.greenpeace.org/en/ocean-defenders/take-action

I wish Greenpeace the best of luck for the sake of the planet,

Power to the peaceful,

Guy

What a great idea, it worked well with the great white sharks a few years back. Also I found out today that most of Japan's udon noodles are imported into the country from Western Australia. Is there any way of finding out if the restaurants that serve whale meat import their noodles? If they do then maybe we can do something about raising the awareness from here. If it leads to the Japanese having a shortage of one of their staple foods they may find less money to put into whaling. Well it is a thought maybe someone can expand on it.

Keep up the good work guys. Stay strong, stay safe.

Surely the blogshere can come to the aid of the party!

I'm not sure how to start one, but I know I've seen blog rings for things like breast cancer. Surely we can do one for whales (or is this really old news for you guys, sorry I'm a bit of a newbie to all this).

Also, I'll post on my blog a link to the ocean defender page and tell all my readers (all 40 of them) to sign up! Is there a logo button you have that I can put on my sidebar (so it doesn't leave the front page after 10 posts).. Andrew, Help!

I have a friend in Iowa, and she buys Gorton's, I've told her they're owned by Whalers, but it's hard for her to relate, she's only ever seen the ocean once in her life when she was 4, it's almost another world. We need to reach the landlocked people, their opinions count just as much as any one elses... I just don't know how to get that across to someone who has never even seen the ocean except for television.

I agree with the Marine's post, whales do need a better PR! It would also be useful for the general public (which is unfortunately static by default) to have as much information about the whales as possible here on Greenpeace's site (or maybe you could create a minisite), things like sounds (whale singing), images and short facts.
This way people could bond to whales, and see it as their own personal responsibility to help stop the killings.

All the best!

Kristian

Hi Lally,

First off I would just like to say GREAT job you guys are doing. I like Marine's idea maybe adding to that I was thinking maybe give the individuals in the group of whales names of the movie stars and ask them to maybe sponsor the whale in some way that's named after them, something like talking about "their own" whale at an interview.

Thanks very much Lally, ...and that's an excellent idea Marine, ...perhaps each of the crew could 'adopt' one. It's too bad no one thought of bringing a paint ball gun along. Nathan...? Humor aside, I've always felt that if our Love is real, ...it is forever, ...because that is the nature of Love. ...and if we stray, ...it was never really there at all. ...This is a long journey, and these heroes of ours will need our support more than ever 7 or 8 months from now. We must hold it in our hearts to continue writing in these blogs, and supporting these people, ...who really are our last bastion of hope to save this earth. ...and it would be nice too, ...to support some of these good people who write in here. They can use some help too, and inspiration. Please share your expression and gratitude, ...as I do now, ...to those who try so hard. ...So in this attempt for me to do my part, ...I've swapped out the video again with 'Don't Kill the Whale' and 'Madrigal'. The latter one of the most Loving and inspirational songs ever written, ...and it is especially appropriate for you defenders of Love down there, ...and for those with them in here that share their hearts. ...For your pleasure and inspiration, ...and my appreciation - http://www.gratefulchild.org/projects/gcweb/gc/html/onward/

As I had no ideas myself on how to persuade people to become Ocean Defenders, I asked my friend Phil. He said that Greenpeace should form partnerships, if they haven't already done it, with other non-whaling organizations and request that their members become Ocean Defenders!
What do you think?

Deep ocean waste is always a problem to cetaceans and marine wildlife. Pick up and dump the waste and put it on their doorsteps to ratify the complete lack of respect for our oceans.
The undocumented deaths from waste is never recorded in the annals to have a significant result opposed to the recorded deaths of whalers.

Sorry this is not an idea to persuade people to become Ocean Defenders.
Maybe some scientists have registered the whales signals, and the "alarm song" could be play to warn the whales to escape from the japanese boats ?
I think this trick was use to frighten birds and keep them off the airports.
And Guy, the free Metro newspaper also exist in France. Brilliant idea !

Well, this message is from Mexico, and first: Activists: Thnx God 4 ur lifes, let´s not be ashamed by any rock hearted about our unique World, Second: Everybody: Great ideas! Thirth: here in Mexico, the marine use to make a contest in Spanish called "el niño y la mar" this is the boy and the sea, it´s a drawing contests promoted all around the country, there are 2 groups: kids and young people(in this case no more than 18), But i mean why not to do somethig similar?, why not to challenge famous artists to paint, draw, sculp, photograph something related the whales and the human?, may be givin the contest a name, to give it purpose, and no neccesary a price, it could be the recognition around the world of their work by Greenpeace and others. And separating the famous artist work, to make it fear, and by the way impact people by their work as known people.

God Bless U a Lot in this marvelous work, and I believe that there´s nothing impossible.

Norha
Mexico
Sorry if i have any grammar mistake, i´m on learning.

Wow, those are all really great ideas! I thought that maybe if Greenpeace had rubber bracelets that say "Save the Whales-Greenpeace Ocean Defender" (or something similar) made to raise money for Ocean Defenders (like the Lance Armstrong ones; many people would buy them & they wouldn't be too expensive to get in bulk. You could sell them for $1-$3 a piece. Also, why not have a sticker download like you had for Argentina. They can be put on Gorton products in supermarkets to try to deter people from buying them.

I wish you all the best! I'm so proud of you & proud to support Greenpeace in all of their endeavors! Keep up the amazing work!

The action in Berlin was BRILLIANT!

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/10922817/

http://edition.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/europe/01/19/greenpeace.whale.reut/

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060119/sc_afp/germanyjapanenvironmentspecies_060119134759

Not suggesting dumping dead whales at every embassy location, but this was a creative good use of a sad situation, and got lots of press.

kudos to Deutschland Greenpeace!

Two good ideas I got from the 17 against whaling update comments.

Here's action you can take to inform others on this issue. Go to msnbc home, us news, environment. Go to the end of the article, "Whale harpoon nearly hits activists." It allows you to e-mail the article. You could send it as a news tip to your tv stations, newspapers, radio, friends, etc. It would be great to send it to people or contacts in Japan. Probably most Japanese people don't know about this story. Most Americans don't know about it either.

Posted by: Marilynn Block at January 18, 2006 07:58 PM

and

Just briefly: Besides asking my government's officials why we were not among the ones signing that demarche, I also sent a letter to the embassies of those seventeen countries that did expressing my appreciation of their taking this action. Sort of on the principle that patting people on the shoulder for a good deed done might encourage them to keep going in that direction. Hope you don't consider this completely silly or superfluous, Pavlos

Posted by: Pavlos at January 19, 2006 02:04 PM

1) If you are a teacher or a lecturer at a college or university, encourage all your students to sign up as ocean defenders next time they are on the computers.

2) Stand by the freezer section for 5 mins every time you go grocery shopping and try talking to people about Gorton's and Greenpeace. This one is only for people who find it easy to talk to strangers!

3) Make a banner for your rear window in your car with the ocean defenders website URL on it.

4) Talk to the manager of your local supermarket and ask them to stop selling Gorton's seafood and to let Gorton's know why they no longer wish to sell their product.

5) If you live near a dive center or any kind of marine store (fishing or sailing gear) ask if they will have a sign at their desk with some Ocean Defender information on it.

6) Become active on discussion forums - scuba diving forums in addition to environmental and political forums are great - and make your signature have a link to the Ocean Defenders page. Also start threads about the current ocean camapigns and link to the Ocean Defenders website as much as possible.

7) Wear an Ocean Defenders T-shirt at the gym. Anyone near you on another machine will have plenty of time to admire it and may google the website later on.

8) Pin a sign on your office door at work, or in your cubicle saying that you will only let people in or talk to them if they sign up!

9) If you are an employer - offer a grub day (dress down day) to people who work for you, if they sign up first.

10) Continue to place your co-workers desk items in jello until they give in and sign up. Threatening to throw things out of the window may also work.

Also I put ocean defending on 43things.com

Film Festivals.
Put together some of your footage from the Southern Ocean for a documentary movie. Think some film festivals have special categories for topics relating to environment and conservation issues.

Your escapades in the Southern Ocean are the stuff of high adventure films - an adversary - the Japanese, boat collisions, harsh weather; rescue attempts - activist overboard having an icy swim in an unforgiving ocean; life and death struggles - putting inflatables in the way of harpoon grenades and helpless whales; good winning over evil, at least temporarily as whales are saved; the rally - 17 countries join the protest......hey, you have all the ingredients for a great story/movie! Seeing daily life aboard the Esperanza and Arctic Sunrise would captivate many viewers - I know it would me.
Like a Mission Impossible plot - seriously!

Kia Ora Most wonderful people, Paikea means whale in maori.Imagine my Maori shame when I found out about Sea Lords.Ive written many letters and will continue.I live south of Perth and SeaLords operate here.Letters and boycott.I'm a Postie and am spreading the word on my mail run.I'm compiling a simple factsheet
and a petition,door to door also at businesses. Encouraging Business outlets by advertising their name on the factsheet.The factsheet will have a summary of the real facts about whaling with addresses to write to,companies to boycott,and how to join up with Greenpeace. Because of a few contacts I'm hoping to distribute 5000 factsheets.Friends in Perth want to distribute letters too.Ive changed my phone greeting Choice idea!Im making back window statements for our car ie Do You Know It Takes 20 min Of Agony For A Harpooned Whale To Die Support Greenpeace, and Sealords Supports Japanese Whaling .Great at traffic lights.I'll be talking to businesses ie resturants etc about Sea Lords.And making stickers to put next to SeaLord products. I have been researhing heaps so I can give informed answers to ? people may ask. My newsletter is nearly finished The feedback from my job has been great.I have spoken to my Dad who is a tribal Elder he is horrified and will speak about this. Paikea has a special place in our culture. our NZ govn deludes and tries to hide many things from us. My Deepest Respect Always, Rikki Te Maro Luckman

I wish I could take the NZ and Australian governments to court for not upholding the laws that theyve agreed to.For their negligence,by knowingly allowing an illegal operation to occur in the Australian waters,by knowingly allowing breaches of the international codes of the sea,and for not protecting NZ and Australian citizens and other nationals from the acts of piracy in their waters.aca the Greenpeace Crew.
Arohanui Rikki

drive a whale up the thames...how many ppl would watch..its very extreme but for the life of one whale to save hundreds of others...man kind has been makeing these kind of ideas for 1000 of yrs and this would be an effective idea to "make" people listen..its the only way????i hope it works!!

Thanks all for the ideas. Please keep them coming. Some fantastic ones so far. Inspiring.

And distriubuting 5000 factsheets. Amazing!

Hey everybody. 1st of all, my mind is being TRULLY being blowned away with all this ideas... and I'm going to do a connection among the ideas... maybe this'll help a lot.
The Ideas pointed have been, as far as I've read:

A) Give a group of sea animals (all o' em, seals, killer whales [by the way, why do they call such a noble animal 'killer'?!?!?], pelicans, narvals, etc.) an IDENTITY (name, age, gender, preferences, species, etc.)and encourage people to know them, help them and adopt them. This includes Movie & Rock Stars, which would put the ocean in a mayor spotlight.
Crow SUGGEST: First and moreso, try to do this naming in the native languages that have been the birthing place or the place where these animals have grown; it’ll reinforce cultures outside the mainstream manipulations, and help those traditions be valued and also have some light over them so they can be even more effective and evolve. Also, you could create this alternative: when you access the info about the group you are taking care of, you also have access to the information that tells you the truth about that particular area of the sea and the Nuclear Events, the Petroleum Disasters, and the dumping that has happened there, and how you can donate with work or money to programs that stop and aid the living sea. If you think it thoroughly, a LOT of people will join to the Ocean Defenders when they know, for example, the type of contamination activities that the Oxy Company is developing near the coasts of Spain or Colombia, or that a huge Petroleum Ship is sunken deep in a coast and that it's pouring about 8,500 gallons of petroleum into the sea, because its hatch is broken.

B) Create partnerships with won’t-kill-whale organizations.

Crow SUGGEST: There are a lot of prejudice against alternative researches all over the world. I encourage EACH AND EVERYONE OF YOU to learn about MASARU EMOTO and his work with water-altered molecules after they are exposed to the vibrations that feelings and words can create. Also, his teacher -you'll find his name in his web page or in similar pages- discovered that every healthy soil on earth is dependable on some little fellows who can create an enormous amount of oxygen, and that when you put this microorganisms back into action in deforested, contaminated or wasted areas, life itself begins to glow and grow back again kicking asses and passing bills. I have done myself a research mixing rituals and microorganisms in synch, and I can tell you I saw a septic dump –you know, raw sewage- in a farm go from the black and brown-grey color it naturally has to a clear and bright color within seconds of pouring this little guys, asides from the odd smell going away in a big way; that event happened about six months ago, and when I returned to see how the water was even when we had the most intense heat wave the water from the sewage had given life to an old forest that’s behind my working crops at the farm. No harm done, and even more birds, frogs and butterflies over the grounds –scientists know 4 fact that this beings are a thumbs-up of natural recovery-. If Greenpeace wants to have a full scale impact, some of its members could begin asking themselves about people that has married the ancient and sacred in acts (ritual) with the scientifically developed mind (technology), and start working with them or learning about their work. I’ll bet my house on you: these individuals won’t only sign in, they’ll give you stronger and faster media to contact people who don’t has Tv or Web access and are interested in these Ocean Defenders procedures.

C) Put the stickers of the Whales in the Metro.
Crow SUGGEST: Nothing, my girls. Ass kickin’ idea. May I suggest we make that too with land endangered species, or rivers?

D) Felyne said something important: how do you contact people that haven’t seen their oceans, when they are land-lubbers and maybe their biggest concern is how to get the food for themselves just for today?
Crow SUGGEST: I heard a South African lady say once: ‘Rivers reflect the conscience of the individual, of the group, of the city. If the river is murky, guilty our souls feels. If we care for the river, we make it stronger and help it develop, we make it clean and the river turns us lovely’. And maybe that’s the trick: make people care about their river. Into rivers, despite many romantic thoughts, a lot of dead bodies are dropped, and overpopulation and industry stains them increasingly. Unless you and I start pressing to stop that from happening, it’ll continue. It can stop, like in the example with micro-organisms, which can be used in larger scale. And pressure, active pressure on water polluting companies can stop them. Remember this: MARKET CRACKS WHEN YOU DON’T BUY. If you learn what products are killing your local nature, and you stop buying it and you expose the facts and you don’t buy and you keep on doing it, the market will have to jump back, and you’ll gain autonomy over money, over your life pace, over your opinions. Asides, if someone treathens you when you make this changes, don’t worry: the companies that send killers are not so many as the people who will make things right, they know that they are outnumbered :) .

E) Dumps are a serious problem. They affect all wildlife.
Crow SUGGESTS: Dumping sucks. It sucks life out of you, me, and the sea (which is our mother, if you think about it). So: campaigns in another little website for the permanent removal of the rivers and sea dumping will make a really good thing… but why stop there? Ocean Defenders website can create a space in which people are encouraged to send letters to stop this wasting process [specific names and activities of dumping, to really unnerve 'em], or people can create blogs for campaigns and activities, or people can develop in Free Software Programs - see COPYLEFT and GNU projects- ideas in which recycling and de-tox of chemical, petrochemicals, and nuclear materials advance in a faster pace. Ocean Defenders can grow as a family if you suggest zones in which you can clean the ocean while being AT land –not necessarily coasts, rivers are in deep feeding the sea, y’know- while others are AT the ocean annoying Nissau so much one day they’ll nail their own asses (hahahaha :)!) and other AT Central Park or France nailing fishing companies boots to the floor and pressing… get my point?. Broad the Ocean Defenders family and the de-tox can accelerate and be more effective. Also, younger people in their early 20’s can begin to create this kind of websites or mail chains about de-tox, recycling, and Bricollage –bricollage is a process in which you use something that has been limited to waste and give it another use, making it cheaper and useful for mechanisms, decorating, or trading-.

F) Rubber bracelets and art workshops relating sea.
Crow SUGGEST: Yes, it would work… maybe if it wasn’t just rubber made, but made in recycled clothes, I think the point would kick ass, give a lot of people work, and it could be developed in small factories so we don’t have a big and uncontrollable fashion phenomenon. Hand-crafted can be very effective if you organize it well. And, make an all out invitation to artists living over the sea or near gulf or swamp coasts to use materials that are ENVIROMENTAL FRIENDLY and to create sculptures or drawing. That’ll connect art and earth more quickly, and it could also raise hell on the art industry for their own polluting –if you don’t think it’s true what I’m saying, please, check out the manors these guys have over California and their contamination path or the Polluted city of Los Angeles-. Hell of a News Flash, heh?!

(Don’t worry, few more ideas and I’ll flee the coop).

G) Ekkaia has a lot of neat ideas on this ThinkCap page. Check her/him out! 

H) Rikki Te Maro Luckman writes us about the position about Native Islanders work.
Crow SUGGEST: The creation of a site of every country that shows, without any Hollywood pretense, the nature and tradition of Islanders and Native Americans or Ancient Europeans, can give a lot of Anthropologists work, and can make people more interested in finding out where are these cultures actually, or if any bastions survived locally and how to support them. Ocean Defenders also create reinforcement on local Native Communities, and elevate standards of life. (Not so tough to do, if you think about it… all you need is organization and peace-guided work). Rikki, truly, from the Crystal Heart of the Earth, In L’ak E’ch, my friend.

Well, those were all the ideas on the page I could find, and the suggestions that came along.
Greenpeace, I tell you this. From my work over Colombia and México and other places, I know people that don’t have access to the Web can’t learn a lot of things. Well, you can’t save the planet alone. But these ideas are here to stay and help.
In this moment I write from Colombia. I’ll have to travel very soon to Manchester. I can tell you that there are countries which are never in the mind of people, and that is disgusting… children growing up without limbs because Monsanto refuses to stop, and the common people are too afraid to react. I beg you, for the sake of this country, the French Guyanas, the Marshall Islands, New Zeland or México, and so, open up the Ocean Defenders family so its arms can touch the world, and let people know that another world is possible without guns to build it.

I am proud as life that you guys are doing all this work.
I hope my ideas will fall in the right ears.

Kudos,
BlueCrow.

I know the editor is reading this 1st, so if you could head this in the right direction...I purchased a great, absolutely fabulous mug that says "I save whales ask me how"...anyway if it was in the form of a travel mug (i.e. lid on top) I would be able to take it everywhere...hence the message getting out more.
just a thought.

NOTE FROM ADELE:
Great idea. I've put this in the "Thinking Caps" section ... and passed it on to our fabulous Mass Networking team.